and to do that, Togmey-zangpo explains that if we’re completely tossed by all the disturbing emotions in our homeland, then it’s best to leave our homeland and rely on seclusion in order to be able to make some progress on the path.

and each of these builds on the previous one. In other words, without having the initial level of motivation, the intermediate and advanced one will not be secure or sincere. Similarly, without having both the initial and intermediate levels of motivation, the advanced one won’t be stable at all. It would be only superficial.

because it’s fairly unlikely that we’re going to gain liberation and enlightenment in this lifetime – although theoretically it’s possible – so we need to be able to continue working on it for lifetime after lifetime.

Now, when we’re very weak in our practice and not at all stable, we need to make sure that we have the proper influence in our lives, and so Togmey-zangpo explains that we need “to rid ourselves of bad friends,” misleading friends who are bad influences on us, and rely on spiritual friends and fully qualified spiritual mentors.

But even if we have a precious human rebirth, over and again we need to realize that that, or a celestial rebirth in some sort of god realm, even that is going to entail a great deal of suffering – it’s still samsara –

Let’s say we believe in rebirth, we are confident that there is such a thing as rebirth, and so with this initial level we could very easily just want, “Always I want to have the most wonderful rebirth, and always be with my friends, and always be with my spiritual teachers, and always be able to study the Dharma, because it’s so beautiful, so lovely.” And still, that’s attachment to samsara,

because we’re not really aiming to get out of samsara. We haven’t really recognized what samsara is all talking about. It’s talking about this all-pervasive suffering, not only that pleasant things have the suffering of change, but this all-pervasive suffering, that in each moment we have confusion and that’s just perpetuating the up and down situation of samsara.

As difficult as it is to sincerely – I mean sincerely from the depth of our hearts – aim for a better rebirth with a precious human life, to really, really believe that and work consciously for that; it’s much more difficult to sincerely, from the depth of our hearts, want to achieve liberation from uncontrollably recurring rebirth and to work for that without the attachment to the precious human life.

Because no matter how wonderful our Dharma friends are, no matter how wonderful our spiritual mentors are, impermanence is there. We’re not going to be able to stay forever with them. Milarepa didn’t stay forever with his teacher Marpa. He also had to leave, and that’s where the really difficult part of attachment is – there.

Therefore, when we aim for a precious human rebirth, we need to aim for it as a stepping stone on the way to liberation and enlightenment, as a useful ship, as Togmey-zangpo refers to it, to take us across the ocean of samsara, without attachment to the ship, because when we get to the other shore we get off the ship.

Even more difficult is the advanced level of motivation, that once we have attained liberation, not to just relax and take it easy in the state of liberation and experience this untainted happiness that we would have then, but to think of everybody else, all our mothers, and to aim with bodhichitta to work even more with voidness, with bodhichitta, and with the far-reaching attitudes, or perfections, to really reach enlightenment to benefit everyone.

Therefore we need to overcome the two extremes, the extreme of samsara – the attachment to samsara, including attachment to the precious human rebirth – and the extreme of nirvana, which is the complacency of just enjoying liberation ourselves. That’s very, very difficult.

We need to see that the precious human rebirth and all our lifetimes up to liberation, and liberation itself, are both stepping stones on the way to enlightenment and there’s no way that we can gain enlightenment without those stepping stones.

These days we can learn about these graded stages of the path: we can read about them; there are many texts that have been translated; we can hear many teachings on them. But just because we are familiar with them, it’s very difficult to actually internalize that and really feel these successive levels of motivation sincerely. And it could take a very large number of years to actually reach one of these stages of spiritual motivation, even though we know about them, but to really feel them that’s a big achievement, even that initial level.

The only way is – as is repeated over and over again here, and in other texts – to first listen to the teachings – study them, then think about them till we understand them, and then, when we’re convinced that this is something which is worthwhile to develop, and that “I am capable of developing it,” then meditate, which means to integrate it into our lives. Only through that process will we actually sincerely feel these levels of motivation, not just know them.

Togmey-zangpo then explains the two methods, or refers to the two methods, for developing bodhichitta. First is the seven-part cause and effect meditation, thinking how everybody has been our mothers in the past,

and to practice the giving and taking, taking on these sufferings of others, whether we’re talking about the other person’s unhappiness itself, or the negative karmic consequences of the harm that they do to us,

and to give them happiness – whether that’s in the form of dedicating to them the positive potentials of our own constructive acts and so on, or giving them praise, rejoicing, and so on – praise in terms of acknowledging their good qualities, rather than returning harm with criticism and negative thoughts.

and also to regard others who are causing us harm, let’s say criticizing us, pointing out our faults and so on, as our teachers, because they’re helping us to recognize our shortcomings and to correct them.

because when things are going badly we can get discouraged, and when things are going well we can get all excited and arrogant. Note that this a reference to the eight worldly Dharmas, the so-called eight transitory things in life, and overreacting to each of them, the negative things – getting all upset and the positive things – getting all excited.

(18) A bodhisattva’s practice is,Even if we are destitute in livelihood and always insulted by people,Or sick with terrible diseases, or afflicted by ghosts,To accept on ourselves, in return, the negative forces and sufferingsof all wandering beings and not be discouraged.

then, if we’re thinking just of ourselves, then our scope is very limited, and we think “poor me,” and in addition to these difficult circumstances that are happening to us, we experience them with a tremendous amount of unhappiness.

If you think about that, we – many of us at least – have experienced something similar to this, particularly when we’re teenagers and we have some sort of problem at home, say our parents are alcoholics or whatever. We tend to think, “I’m the only one in the world that has this problem,” and we feel very isolated, alone, and unbelievably unhappy. But when we learn that there are many others who have the same problem – we go to a support group for example, with many, many other people who have the similar problem – then our scope is much larger. We start to think in terms of everybody’s problem, “I’m not alone,” and we start to think of a solution for everybody. Our way of experiencing our own individual problem is very, very changed, isn’t it?

If we expand our scope and, as we were discussing yesterday, think in terms of the exchange of self with others, in terms of what is the basis upon which we are labeling the conventional “me,” and having concern for eliminating suffering, if we expand that beyond just this one individual person, “me,” to everybody and, as it says here, “ accept on ourselves the negative forces and sufferings of all wandering beings,” then we will “ not be discouraged.” You get discouraged when you think in terms of only, “Oh, me, I can’t possibly deal with this.”

When we think in terms of everybody and that this is an appropriate basis for “me,” and my concern for eliminating suffering, it’s very important that we have that together with the understanding of the voidness of the “me.” It’s not that instead of having a little solid me, now we have an enormous solid me – that is not at all what we’re aiming for here and that would also be a great fault in this practice, “Now I am everybody and now I will take on the world,” then we can be even more discouraged.

In other words, we need to just take – when we have an enormous task, the most enormous obviously would be to liberate everybody, every single limited being in the universe and bring them to enlightenment – but even if we think in terms of a slightly more limited enormous task, if we think in terms of the solid me, then obviously we get very discouraged, “How can I possibly do this?” But if we don’t think in terms of the solid me separate from the whole thing, from the task and so on, then you just do it, and that, I think, is the key here in terms of taking on enormous tasks – one just does it. The image that comes to my mind – I live in Germany – when you see the pictures of some of the cities that were just totally destroyed in the Second World War and then you think in terms of, “How in the world did they rebuild these cities?” You live in a city and it’s completely destroyed into rubble with these huge firestorms in Dresden, do you take care of just your own little house? No, just taking care of your own little house – without the infrastructure of the city you can’t live anyway – you’r e totally interconnected with everybody, so you just do it, without thinking, “Oh, how can we possibly rebuild this city?” You just do it and gradually it gets done.

(18) A bodhisattva’s practice is,Even if we are destitute in livelihood and always insulted by people,Or sick with terrible diseases, or afflicted by ghosts,To accept on ourselves, in return, the negative forces and sufferingsof all wandering beings and not be discouraged.

The other critical situation requiring special Dharma practice – in addition to when we get discouraged with terrible things happening – is when we get overinflated and conceited when wonderful things happen.

(19) A bodhisattva’s practice is, even if we are sweetly praised,Bowed to with their heads by many wandering beings,Or have obtained (riches) comparable to the fortuneof Vaishravana (the Guardian of Wealth),Never to be conceited, by seeing that worldly prosperity has no essence.

We may be in situations in which people praise us and say how wonderful we are, what wonderful work we’re doing, and they respectfully bow their heads to us, and we’re very wealthy and so on. But the way to avoid becoming conceited by that is to realize that this has no essence at all: this is what Togmey-zangpo says. In fact it can be a hindrance, having all this praise and fame.

If we think about it, very, very famous people, movie stars and so on, they can’t even go outside, they can’t go to a club, they can’t do anything without a flock of paparazzi, these really aggressive photographers, running after them, people seeing them screaming, wanting to tear off their clothes and so on. It’s horrible.

Even if we are not a famous movie star, if we’re famous in some other area, then the more famous we are, the more demands there are on our time, the more e-mails we receive, the more invitations we receive, and it just becomes overwhelming. We can’t do anything that we want to do.

If we’re very wealthy, then there are so many people who are constantly bothering us, wanting to have money from us. We feel that “Nobody really likes me for myself” – although that’s a weird statement from a Buddhist point of view – “but they love me just for my money.”

To avoid conceit, we need to see the disadvantages of all this praise and fame and money, and in addition to realize that they have no essence, in the sense that not only can they not bring us ultimate happiness, but they don’t last. And just as easily as we may gain these things, we can just as easily lose them, like the examples in Buddhism of the celestial realms – the divine beings that are born in these wonderful states, but then fall.

To avoid discouragement when things are going poorly with us, we take on the suffering from others and develop compassion for others who have a similar type of problem. When things are going very well with us, then it’s important not to become conceited, to see that these things have disadvantages and no essence. If we have money, if we have fame, if we have many things that are favorable, in a sense – although we just said that they have disadvantages, but they do have certain advantages as well – to use them to benefit others, rather than just being conceited about them. With money, for example, we can support various spiritual efforts.

(19) A bodhisattva’s practice is, even if we are sweetly praised,Bowed to with their heads by many wandering beings,Or have obtained (riches) comparable to the fortuneof Vaishravana (the Guardian of Wealth),Never to be conceited, by seeing that worldly prosperity has no essence.

(20) A bodhisattva’s practice is to tame our mental continuumsWith the armed forces of love and compassion,Because, if we haven’t subdued the enemy which is our own hostility,Then even if we have subdued an external enemy, more will come.

Shantideva explains this point in relation to patience as a way for overcoming anger and hostility, whereas Togmey-zangpo explains it in terms of love and compassion. But love and compassion, and, on the other hand, patience are both the opponent forces for anger.

Shantideva uses the image of leather. He says we can’t cover the entire surface of the earth with leather so that we don’t get thorns in our foot. But if we simply cover our own feet with leather, then we can go anywhere without being harmed. Similarly, we’re not going to be able to get rid of all external enemies, but if we get rid of our internal enemy – anger – then we can go anywhere without being harmed.

Because the real enemy are these internal hindrances, our internal disturbing emotions, then the opponent forces for those are like the “armed forces” in a battle. Remember, Buddha came from a warrior caste, and so it’s not surprising that a great deal of the imagery that we find in Buddhism is martial imagery, imagery from the military. Sometimes that shocks people, but we have to remember what caste Buddha came from.

I think that there is a certain point that is helpful in using this military imagery, which is that the dealing with our disturbing emotions really is like a battle. It is an internal battle and we really have to fight very hard. And it’s dangerous, sometimes we’re going to get hurt, like we’r e doing a purification practice and all sorts of very unpleasant things come up. But we need to deal with that in order to overcome the deeply rooted disturbing emotions.

If we’re going to fight a battle, we need to have a great deal of courage. We need to be very brave and not be afraid. That’s true not only in terms of fighting an external battle, but fighting the internal battle. When we look at the translation in Tibetan of the word bodhisattva, they have added a syllable at the end of it, which in Tibetan means “courageous,” or “a brave one,” that’s not actually there in the Sanskrit.

The Tibetan word for bodhisattva is jang-chub sem-pa. Sem-pa would be sattva, if it were spelt in one way, which is just a being, someone with a mind, that jang-chub (bodhi) – is aimed at enlightenment, but that pa at the end of sem-pa, the Tibetans spell it in a different way – dpa’ – which is another word pronounced exactly the same way as pa, which means a brave one, a courageous one.

(20) A bodhisattva’s practice is to tame our mental continuumsWith the armed forces of love and compassion,Because, if we haven’t subdued the enemy which is our own hostility,Then even if we have subdued an external enemy, more will come.

We know that from our experience. If you get over anger with one person, or one incident in our life, still we’re going to get angry with more and more things in the future. It doesn’t solve the issue at all.

(21) A bodhisattva’s practice is immediately to abandonAny objects that cause our clinging and attachment to increase,For objects of desire are like salt water:The more we have indulged (in them,our) thirst (for them) increases (in turn).

This is referring to the fact that, as is discussed with the suffering of change, that worldly pleasures, things that make us happy, and that we’re very attached to, and have great desire for, are never going to satisfy. We’re never going to have enough.

This is referring here specifically to “objects that cause our clinging and attachment to increase.” There is a difference between longing desire and clinging and attachment. Longing desire is for something that we don’t have. Clinging and attachment is for something that we do have and we don’t want to let go.

If there are objects that we possess that we’re very, very attached to – I’m thinking of a friend who is unbelievably attached to his books, to Dharma books; he compulsively buys more and more and more of them and of course never has the time to read them –

the remedy for that, Togmey-zangpo is saying, is to abandon these. What I’ve suggested to him is to give them away to a Dharma center, give them away to some sort of larger facility like a Dharma center library, where other people can use them, because the more that he has them around, the more attachment and clinging he has to buy even more.

Whatever it is that we might have, and that we cling to, and we’re so attached to, the initial remedy for that is to give it away, whether it’s our clothes, whether it is – whatever, our house, to open it up to other people to use, like sometimes people with a large house open it up as a meeting place for Dharma activities, these sort of things.

Togmey-zangpo says, and this image comes much earlier as well in the Buddhist literature, that these “ objects of desire” that we’re so attached to “ are like salt water.” The more we accumulate, the more thirsty we get. The more of these objects of attachment that we accumulate, the more attached we become. We just want more and more and we never have enough. Who ever thinks that they have enough money in the bank, for example? They always want more and more and more.

Obviously just to give up these objects that we’re so attached to is not the deepest solution to the problem, because still we could be very desirous to get them back. But as an initial way of dealing with it, it can be very helpful.

The earlier verse, in which Togmey-zangpo says, if we’re very attached to “ homelands, where attachment to friends and loved ones tosses us like water,” then it’s best to temporarily “ leave our homelands.” This is reminiscent of this point here in this verse as well.

and let go in terms of them getting married and moving elsewhere. There are a lot of parents that, no matter what partner their children have, they always disapprove, because basically they’re attached to the child and they don’t want them to go.

Or people who keep animals, for example, let’s say you have dogs or cats, and they have puppies or kittens. If you’re very attached, then you just keep them and then you have more puppies and more kittens and it just gets worse and worse and worse. So, again, one needs to give away the puppies and kittens.

(21) A bodhisattva’s practice is immediately to abandonAny objects that cause our clinging and attachment to increase,For objects of desire are like salt water:The more we have indulged (in them,our) thirst (for them) increases (in turn).

We could of course ask the question, does he really mean that we have to abandon our computer, our cell phone?

or who have the computer on all day, connected to the Internet so that they don’t miss any e-mail as soon as it comes. They’re constantly checking their e-mail. And they’re also, like myself, a bit of a news junkie and so every once in a while they look at the news, either on the Internet or a lot of people are addicted to CNN and watch the same news over and over and over again. So again, this advice is very helpful, to abandon that. And even if we don’t abandon it completely, to do – what I find very difficult to do – to check the e-mail only once a day. Look at the news only once a day, don’t have it on all the time. Just use the cell phone when you need it; don’t at every opportunity play with it, like you’re playing with yourself.

What is the best, and probably only way to keep to a diet, is to not buy any chocolate, not buy any cookies, not buy any cakes. Just don’t have them in the house. If they’re not there, we won’t eat them.

The next section is concerning developing deepest bodhichitta. There is conventional, or relative bodhichitta, which is aimed at enlightenment to benefit all beings and then there’s deepest bodhichitta, which is aimed at voidness. So it’s the realization of voidness and this is essential for the bodhisattva practice.

(22) A bodhisattva’s practice is not to take to mindInherent features of objects taken and minds that take them,by realizing just how things are.No matter how things appear, they are from our own minds;And mind-itself is, from the beginning,parted from the extremes of mental fabrication.

This verse can be understood in many, many different ways. We can understand it from a Yogachara-Svatantrika point of view; we can understand it from a Prasangika point of view. We can understand it, and in both of those, from the point of view of the Gelugpa explanation of it, we can understand it from the Sakya point of view, which after all is where Togmey-zangpo is coming from.

As His Holiness the Dalai Lama pointed out, if we look at this from a Svatantrika point of view, we can say that… the Svatantrikas say that conventionally things have inherent findable characteristics that make them what they are. That’s on a conventional level, but on the deepest level these things don’t have true existence. So we can understand this to say “ not to take to mind,” in other words, don’t pay attention to this conventional level of where things have these inherent findable characteristics, but realize just how things are – think in terms of the deepest level of voidness.

From a Sakya point of view, we start out with a Chittamatra understanding that there are no features on the side of objects and the minds that take them – that’s often translated as “subject and object” – that inherently makes them coming from different sources, like they are external objects out there and mind is in here, and realize that they both come from a same seed of karma.

or we can understand it the way the Sakyas do, which is first you get a Chittamatra understanding and then a Madhyamaka understanding, so we understand that these appearances of objects and the minds that cognize them – both of them – come from the mind, the seed of karma, the mind.

Then “ mind-itself is, from the beginning, parted from the extremes of mental fabrication.” This is the understanding of the voidness of the mind. Even though the mind projects appearances, even though the mind might project false appearances of a duality, nevertheless that mind itself doesn’t have true existence.

So the mind is “ parted from the extremes of mental fabrication,” that it itself doesn’t have true existence and by its nature it doesn’t have to be projecting appearances of either true existence, or dual existence or external existence, depending on what level we understand this verse.

But what I’m trying to indicate here is that when we come across a verse like this, this is something that we have to go very, very deeply into and realize that there are many ways of understanding it.

And it’s not so easy to recognize the subtlest levels. And so first we have to refute, or get rid of – get rid of in the sense of realize that this is impossible – the grosser levels, and then we work on the subtler and subtler levels.

that things might appear to us as if some object is out there coming from its own source and my mind that sees it is coming from its own source, completely separate – like you are a horrible person that’s coming from out there and then I see you as a horrible person.

We find a similar way of discussing voidness in the Seven-Point Attitude-Training – which Togmey-zangpo also wrote a commentary to – it also explains voidness from a Sakya point of view. Mind you, this is written centuries before Gelugpa ever developed, centuries before Tsongkhapa lived.

We can look at it as saying that, “Don’t pay attention to what conventionally exists,” which would be these inherent findable features on the side of objects and the mind that takes them, “ but think in terms of the deepest level,” that everything is devoid of that. Everything exists just in terms of mental labeling. And so no matter how they appear, it’s from our own minds, in other words, it’s in terms of mental labeling,

And if we understand it as the nature of the mind, then we can understand it either as the relative nature of the mind, the conventional nature of making appearances and cognizing them, and that doesn’t have true existence and doesn’t necessarily by nature make these false appearances.

Even if we don’t understand very much of this explanation, nevertheless if we can appreciate that the teachings on voidness are very, very profound and have many levels with which we can understand them, then we develop respect and interest in trying to go deeper and deeper with it and understand it.

All of this is very, very important in terms of trying to help others.

Y esto es muy importante para poder ayudar a los demás.

If we think that this poor suffering being out there, there is something in them from its own side that makes them a poor suffering being, then no matter what we do to try to help them, that they’ll never change.

(22) A bodhisattva’s practice is not to take to mindInherent features of objects taken and minds that take them,by realizing just how things are.No matter how things appear, they are from our own minds;And mind-itself is, from the beginning,parted from the extremes of mental fabrication.

For instance, if we just say, “There’s no chocolate in our house,” we might not be very convinced of that. But if we search everywhere in our house and we can’t find any chocolate, then we are much more firm in our conviction that there is no chocolate. Or, “There’s nothing interesting on TV.” We can conclude that just by not even looking, or we could search through all the channels. And when we search through all the channels and we find nothing interesting, then we’r e more convinced that “There’s nothing interesting on TV.”

So although something seems to exist solidly from its own side, it appears like that, but that’s just like an illusion. An illusion appears, but it doesn’t exist the way that it appears. It appears to be solid, it’s not.

Togmey-zangpo has two verses here concerning this subsequent realization that everything is like an illusion. First in relation to objects that are very pleasing and pleasant, and then in relation to objects that are not very nice at all. Both of them are like an illusion.

(23) A bodhisattva’s practice is,When meeting with pleasing objects,not to regard them as truly existent,Even though they appear beautifully, like a summer’s rainbow,And (thus) to rid ourselves of clinging and attachment.

When we meet with beautiful objects, whether they’re beautiful people or beautiful things that we like, then the advice here is to see that they don’t exist with some inherent findable features on their side that makes them beautiful and, “So wonderful and therefore I have to have them,”

Shantideva uses the example of the illusion of a horse, that if a magician conjures up an illusion of a horse, to kill that illusion of the horse and to kill an actual horse is quite different in terms of the karmic consequences, in terms of does it affect somebody else, like the horse.

Therefore everything is like an illusion, “ like a summer’s rainbow.”In this way we try “ to rid ourselves of clinging and attachment.” Here, this is referring to automatically arising clinging and attachment,

that automatically we feel that, even if we’ve had nonconceptual cognition of voidness and we get rid of attachment that might be based on having learned some doctrine from some non-Buddhist school, nevertheless we still have this automatically arising attachment. So we need to keep on working with voidness.

(23) A bodhisattva’s practice is,When meeting with pleasing objects,not to regard them as truly existent,Even though they appear beautifully, like a summer’s rainbow,And (thus) to rid ourselves of clinging and attachment.

Therefore the bodhisattva practice that Togmey-zangpo mentioned two verses earlier, which is to abandon objects that cause our clinging and attachment to increase, that is a temporary solution. But the deepest solution is to understand the voidness of these beautiful – seemingly beautiful – objects, to realize that they don’t exist in this impossible way of being truly existently beautiful and pleasing. That appearance is like an illusion.

(24) A bodhisattva’s practice is,At the time when meeting with adverse conditions,to see them as deceptive,For various sufferings are like the death of our child in a dreamAnd to take (such) deceptive appearances to be true is a tiresome waste.

So the various sufferings that we have, to view them as inherently from their own side being “So horrible,” and “Awful,” and “I can’t take it,” and so on – that appearance is like the appearance of “ the death of our child in a dream.”

Similarly, even when we are awake, although it’s not the same as a dream, nevertheless things appear – and here specifically “ adverse conditions,” difficult things that happen to us – they appear to be truly existent and so on, but they are not. That’s impossible.

So that “ deceptive appearance, if we take it as true,” if we consider it to be true, that’s really, as Togmey-zangpo says, “ a tiresome waste,” a waste of our time, which just makes us very tired and having suffering.

It’s like, for instance, if we bang our foot against a piece of furniture in the dark, it hurts. Sure, it hurts, but it’s a tiresome waste to take it, “Oh this is a horrible thing that’s happened to me,” and then jump up and down and make a big deal out of it. That’s a tiresome waste. It certainly doesn’t make us feel any better and it doesn’t accomplish anything. It just prolongs our suffering.

This type of thing is a tiresome waste, to take the deceptive appearance – that this appears as though, “Ah, this is the most horrible thing that’s ever happened to me!” – to really take that as true is a tiresome waste of time.

(24) A bodhisattva’s practice is,At the time when meeting with adverse conditions,to see them as deceptive,For various sufferings are like the death of our child in a dream And to take (such) deceptive appearances to be true is a tiresome waste.

Question: Talking about evolution, because you talked about different levels of motivation and different scopes – what is the idea of Buddhism in terms of our evolution as human beings, because I heard you mention that there is devolution, we can go backwards and be reborn as a cockroach depending on our actions?

From the point of view of an individual being, then depending on what we do – the karmic tendencies and potentials that we build up – then we can either have more suffering or less suffering. Remember, the condition of samsara is that it goes up and down, so we can either have a better situation or a worse situation.

It’s only when we get to a certain level of realization that our realization is so stable that we won’t go back in terms of devolving into a lower rebirth and losing our realizations. But that’s very advanced. And we have to remember that in Buddhism progress is never linear, it’s never that it always gets better and better and better. Progress is always nonlinear, up and down, up and down.

This is not inconsistent with the theory of evolution of Darwin in terms of the species that inhabit this planet. There we have adaptation, the survival of the fittest and so on; that’s something quite different.

So hundreds of millions of years ago, when the human life-form was not available on this planet, it would have been available on another planet, and we could have been born as a human there. Likewise, if we have the karma to be reborn as a dinosaur, or something similar that’s no longer an available life-form on this planet, it could be available on another planet, no big deal.

As we make progress, until we become completely free of samsara as an arhat, even as we make progress from day to day it’s going to go up and down. Over the long-term there can be progress, but some days our meditation goes well, some days it doesn’t. Some days we feel like meditating, some days we don’t. That’s just what samsara is all about. What do you expect?

Question: I would like to know if science at this stage has been able to prove through quantum physics and quantum mechanics that things don’t exist as they appear, and in this way validate from a scientific point of view the view of emptiness? Is there something similar in science that could validate rebirth?

In the sense that a particle, a photon is how it’s usually described, a photon has equal probability of being a particle or a wave, and a photon has equal probability of being in two places at the same time. So in a sense you can say that it’s in both places at the same time, but you can’t say from its own side, because you can never speak in terms of what it is from its own side. It’s only when an observer observes it, or measures it, that then it’s in one state or it’s in one position. So that indicates very clearly that the appearance of things in any specific situation or state is totally dependent on the mind and there’s nothing from the side of the object that makes it this or that by its own power.

The real issue is to understand not only the metaphysical consequences of that, but the psychological consequences of that and the emotional consequences of that, in terms of dealing with life’s situations.

Now in terms of rebirth, that’s very difficult to prove, and so the approach that His Holiness the Dalai Lama always takes is, if you can’t disprove it, then it is the obligation of science to investigate it.

The whole issue involves the issue of, “Is there such a thing as mind?” or is everything reducible to matter and energy? For that we need to understand what we mean by mind. If we understand that in terms of experience, subjective experience, then it’s hard to say that subjective experience is matter or energy. It has a basis in matter and energy, but it’s not the same.

And if we can accept that there is such a thing as subjective experience, then we need to apply the laws of conservation of matter and energy, in terms of continuity, and can there be an absolute beginning, an absolute end and so on.

or we could cling with our concepts to that the things actually correspond exactly to our concepts, in other words things exist in some sort of box, that “There it is, it’s just that thing, like in the dictionary, it says it’s this category, this thing.”

“Craving” as a technical term is referring to when we experience happiness, to crave not to be separated from it, and when we experience unhappiness or suffering, to crave to be parted from it. Crave there means “to want.”

I think that we can see with this example that the analysis that we have in Buddhist psychology of these various states of mind, these disturbing states of mind, is very, very sophisticated, and they make lots and lots of very fine distinctions and have technical terms for them, for which unfortunately sometimes we don’t have exact corresponding terms in our languages. Therefore it’s necessary to look at the definitions, look at the context within which the terms are used.

When we come across terms in a text, if we don’t know the original terminology, that’s very difficult. If we do know the original terminology, then we would have to know the definition of it, in order to really understand what the verse or text is talking about.

Question: For me, understanding this concept of emptiness is very difficult, but when I hear your explanation and examples, it’s like, “Oh yes, it’s clear and everything is like a dream.” But when we face everyday situations, it’s very difficult to apply this understanding that everything is like a dream or like an illusion. How can we integrate this understanding in our lives?

Answer: The only way to integrate it is to meditate on it, which means to practice it over and over and over again, to think more about it. And in meditation, once we’ve understood it, to think of different situations that we’re facing and try to recognize, to distinguish – go back to our word “distinguish” – the characteristic feature of it being like an illusion, or a dream, that it appears to be solid and real, but it’s not.

And even though I said to them, “Well, are people really going to have any time to come to such a course? It’s Easter as well,” and “Are you going to have any time to organize it? Maybe this isn’t the best time for the visit.” They said “No, no, it doesn’t matter. Come, it’ll be great.”

Then a few weeks before I was supposed to leave, I get an e-mail from them saying that, “It’s too much to organize and it’s too difficult to organize both trips,” His Holiness and myself, “and so we’re canceling.”

And so I didn’t blame them; I didn’t write back, “I told you so.” I went out and I investigated what would be involved with canceling, the amount of money that they would lose actually in canceling the ticket and the inconvenience that people here in Mexico would have in terms of the organization. So again, “OK, no big deal, it’s canceled,” and I wrote them back what would be the consequences of canceling.

So like a dream, so I wrote back to them and said, “You’re going to have to pay so much money for the cancellation and the Mexicans are going to have to pay so much money more for the more expensive plane ticket now,” and they wrote back saying, “Ah, we don’t want to cause so much trouble, come anyway.”

Then, twelve days before I was supposed to go, I get another e-mail from Columbia saying that, “ Well, we actually asked the students, will anybody be here for your teachings during the Easter holiday, and actually almost nobody will be there including the translator, and so we need to cancel.”

Fine, like an illusion, I wasn’t happy or unhappy. I went and cancelled the ticket and bought another ticket for Mexico and – finished. I didn’t give it any more thought, so I didn’t suffer, I wasn’t all excited. No big deal, like a dream,